How Astronauts Celebrate Christmas in Space

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The six astronauts aboard the International Space Station can't
come home for the holidays, but they're doing their best to make
the season bright hundreds of miles above Earth's surface.

The spaceflyers have decked the halls of the $100 billion
orbiting lab, and — like many of us Earthbound folks — they plan
to celebrate Christmas with a party and a feast.

"We've already put up decorations, and we've gathered together
all the cards and gifts that our friends and families have sent
to us, and we're planning a couple of big meals," NASA astronaut
Dan Burbank, commander of the space station's current
Expedition 30 mission, said last week. "That'll be great."

Skeleton crew no more

Burbank and two cosmonaut colleagues, Anton Shkaplerov and
Anatoly Ivanishin, had been holding down the orbital fort by
themselves until Friday (Dec. 23).

The addition of American Don Pettit, Russian Oleg Kononenko, and
Dutchman Andre Kuipers brought the space station back up to its
full strength of six crewmembers. The three newcomers will
contribute some Christmas cheer to the festivities, but little in
the way of actual presents.

"In terms of gifts, when you're off in the frontier, you're not
going to waste upmass on something like that," Pettit told
SPACE.com in a preflight interview.

Despite those mass constraints, a fair bit of holiday flair has
made it up to the orbiting lab since NASA and its international
partners began building the 431-ton structure in 1998. There's
even a two-foot-tall artificial Christmas tree beneath which a
present or two can be wedged.

Christmas in space

The holidays can be tough for people separated from their friends
and family — and zipping around the planet 240 miles (386
kilometers) above your seven billion fellow Earthlings imposes a
special kind of separation.

But Burbank said he and his other crewmembers don't feel too
lonely or isolated.

"In a very real sense, we're not far from those who care about
us," he said. "For one thing, we have hundreds of people
worldwide in control centers watching over us and our space
station 24/7. And we also know that our families and friends are
thinking about us and supporting us every step of the way."

Besides, if the crewmates ever start feeling down, there's always
that amazing view out the window.

"Our planet is so beautiful, peaceful and serene when you look at
it from space — the most beautiful holiday card you could
imagine," Burbank wrote Dec. 17 on the astronaut blog
Fragile Oasis.